Thanksgiving with the Indians

Did you know that Rwandans don’t celebrate Thanksgiving?  Obviously!  The pilgrims never landed here, but the Asian Indians have opened a few delicious restaurants.  So we ended the day celebrating with them.

Thanksgiving began on Wednesday evening with all the preparations.  I actually made pumpkin bread from scratch!  Yes, me who doesn’t like to cook and especially doesn’t like to bake!  Check out me cutting the pumpkin with electricity and then without, by candlelight.  Thankfully, the power was only out for about 20 minutes that evening.  To my surprise the pumpkin bread turned out well and tasted almost like pumpkin bread from a can. 

I spent Thanksgiving morning teaching English.  We talked about American Thanksgiving Traditions and enjoyed the homemade pumpkin bread and banana muffins with a cup of hot tea.  Tea being a mug of hot whole milk, fresh from the cow, seasoned with lemongrass and loaded with sugar.  I always appreciate it when I’m allowed to put my own sugar in - it’s not quite so loaded that way!  And it’s very delicious.  It’s one of my new Rwandan cravings.  I can feel my bones getting stronger!!

The best part of the morning was explaining how Thanksgiving is a time for family.  As I was missing my family, the teachers interrupted me to tell me that they were my new family and I could celebrate Thanksgiving with them.  It’s been amazing at how quickly Rwanda has felt like home in so many ways.  I miss my friends and family terribly at times, but I’m so grateful for the Rwanda YFC staff who have eagerly welcomed me into their family.  It’s been a great and surprising gift!

 

 I’m also very grateful to have part of my biological family here with me.  Brad & Kiki have been here for four years and have two girls - Oliviana, age two, and the newly adopted Grace, age 5 months.  They’ve taken care of me, given me a safe place to adjust, and shown me the ropes of living cross-culturally.  But more than that I’m grateful for the chance to partner with them.  God has used them to accomplish mighty things through Kigali Christian School and it’s a pleasure to see it first hand and be a part of it.  

We celebrated Thanksgiving together by checking out a new Indian restaurant in town.  Preparing an American Thanksgiving meal just isn’t worth the effort (pulling the feathers out of your newly butchered turkey, making your own cream of mushroom soup, pumpkin desserts from scratch,...), so we decided Indian was a good alternative.  The food was delicious, especially the garlic nan, and best of all there were no dishes to do!  A great way to end a great day!

 Check out the album to the left for more pictures of Thanksgiving Day!

December 2009 Newsletter

I'LL BE HOME FOR CHRISTMAS...

I really will be home for the holidays - in my new home in Rwanda, that is.  I’ve spent my first few months with Brad and Kiki as I settle into Rwandan life.  However, this month I moved into my own place.  I look forward to settling in to my new neighborhood and having additional opportunities for entertaining and hospitality.

AND HAVE A NEW FAMILY TO CELEBRATE WITH

Meet my new brothers and sisters, the ECK staff.  I spent Thanksgiving morning teaching English,
explaining our Thanksgiving traditions and the
importance of family.  As I was saying,  “My family cannot be here...” I was interrupted in a unison outburst,  “No, we are your family.”

I’m so grateful for my new family here.  We’ve spentthe school break together in English training.  The staff are working hard and the training has been very enjoyable.  During this time, we’ve also been meditating on God’s grace.  It’s been a refreshing and unifying time as we prepare for the next school year to begin in January.

AND SO MANY REASONS TO BE THANKFUL:

• For the ways God pursues us with his love.  
• For all of you who are thinking and praying for me and Rwanda YFC 
• For my new Rwandan family and the beginning of lifelong friendships 
• For a successful school year with our P6 (6th grade) students doing well on the national exams, in spite of the language change. 
• For the opportunity to follow the P6 students by adding a S1 (7th grade) class in January.
  

 

Some days are for tears

Some days are for tears.

Today was one of them.  Some tears are for joy, others for sadness.  Some are for overwhelming sorrow, others are for hope and love.  And still others are for anger.  I had them all today. 

The sadness tears began with an email from home.  I love to hear updates from home, but they often bring sadness as I realize how much I am missing out on at home.  My best friends are growing and maturing and taking new adventures that I can’t be apart of in a day to day kind of way.  And so I cry tears of sadness.  I’m sad about the things I’m missing, but excited to see how God is at work and the good he has for those I love.  I not ready to come home, but I wish home could come to me. 

And then there were tears of overwhelming sorrow, mixed with hope and love.  Today, we had appointments in Grace’s adoption process.  Grace is a 6 month old, happy and thriving Rwandan baby girl.  It’s by the grace of God that she is alive today.  She was abandoned the day she was born, but fortunately, was found by a shepherd.  He took her to the local hospital, hungry, covered with insect bites, and with a dangerously low body temperature.  Through a series of miraculous events, she recovered to full health and found her way into Brad & Kiki’s home.  While attitudes are changing, it is still common for unwanted babies to be abandoned or killed after they are born.  It is a miracle that she lived through her first hours, that the shepherd acted with compassion rather than turning away, that she made her way into the loving hands of the hospital staff, and that God had moved Brad & Kiki’s heart to take her in despite all of the unknowns that lay ahead.  Her story is one of overwhelming sorrow, as it reminds us of the harsh realities of life in this fallen world -  realities that kill and destroy innocent children.  But her story is one of hope and love.  So many people extended God’s love to Grace because of their hope in the God of all hope.  And there are many others here in Rwanda who share that hope.  We met two more of them today at our appointment.

Jocelyne and Josephine are Rwandan/Canadian twins from a pretty amazing family.  Most of their family still lives in Rwanda - 4 of their brothers are currently serving in the Sudan as a part of the UN peace keeping mission.  Out of gratitude for the life they have been given, they have started a charity (shelterthem.com) that serves orphans and street kids.  The stories of these kids brings overwhelming sorrow.  No child should have to endure the kinds of suffering many children around the world face.  But, the story of Jocelyne, Josephine, and their family provides hope -  hope in the power of God’s love and how it moves ordinary people to do extraordinary things.    It was an honor to have the twins stand as witnesses in Grace’s adoption. 

And then there were tears of anger.  There are some aspects of Rwandan life that are infuriating to a critical analyst from a western culture.  After 5 trips to the immigration office, 3 phone calls, 2 emails, and 2 text messages, I found out that my Visa is still pending because one of the documents for my application is missing.  Infuriating!!  So tomorrow I will return with the missing document and hopefully have a Visa soon.  Most things are much more complicated (to someone who doesn’t quite understand the system or the culture) and take much longer than they need to.  But that’s just a fact of life in a developing country that’s rebuilt everything in 15 years since the genocide.  It’s also a fact of life in a culture that values community and relationships over time and efficiency.  All of life is at a slower, less efficient pace.  There are days like today when it’s infuriating, but there are other days when lingering with new friends is refreshing.  

Go with the flow

Go with the flow.  It’s my motto in Rwanda.   Go with the flow means:

1. You do what others are doing because you have no idea what’s being said.
2. On Thursday night, you’re asked to teach a seminar on Friday morning. 
3. On Thursday night, you’re informed that the seminar you prepared for Friday morning has been canceled, because the teacher in-service day has just become a regular school day. 
4. You just show up with no expectations about how you will get there, what will happen once you are there, or when it will be over.
5. You find out on Friday evening, that Monday is a holiday and there is no school.
6. You find out on Saturday afternoon that Monday is a holiday and there is no school.
7. You wonder, “Where are we going?” when the moto-taxi driver takes you to a familiar place but goes the unfamiliar round-about way.  Is he showing me off?  Am I his prized bright skinned rider?
8. You hold the communal motorcycle helmet on with one hand while you hold onto the moto-bike with the other.
9. You hope there is water when it’s brown and you need to flush it down.
10. The local government informs schools that they need to send all their teachers to a meeting in a few hours and while school is in session -  “Just give the students exercises and leave a few teachers behind to watch the 500+ kids,” they say.
11. Schedules are loose estimates. Things happen when they happen.
12. You always have 3 or 4 backup plans.  And you frequently use number 3 and 4.
13. When people are laughing, you assume it’s about you and it doesn’t bother you.
14. “Normal” is in a continuous state of change.
15. You give extemporaneous speeches or prayers.    
16. You don’t ask what it is, you just eat it.  
17. It can rain at any time, but if you wait a few minutes it will pass.
18. You don’t wonder where the amoeba came from or how you got it, you just accept the resulting dysentery as a part of life.
19. You spend several hours at the clinic while the nurse takes your information and vitals in the waiting room surrounded by all the other patients and the lab tech walks in and says “Was that your sample?”  and then proceeds to tell the nurse exactly what they found in your sample.  HIPAA violation?
20. People blatantly stare at you all the time, watching your every move and you don’t even notice.
    

October 2009 Newsletter

It’s been a busy month!   Here’s a few of the highlights for me:

Language Study:  I’ve begun language study in Kinyarwanda and it has been invaluable to me as an English teacher.  It’s great to be able to apply what I teach and to experience the frustrations of not being able to communicate, the diligence and discipline required to learn a language, and the fear of making ridiculous mistakes.  I have a much greater compassion for my students and it’s given me a better sense of how much content can be learned effectively in one hour a day. 

This is Monique, my language helper.  She is also the team leader of the Nursery Classes.  She's an amazing women - a widow caring for her 3 biological and 3 adopted children. 











Dusting off my vocal cords:  Music plays a large role in Rwandan culture.  Rwandans love to sing and dance.  It’s a part of every event from church services to graduation ceremonies to simply visiting friends.  So, I’ve been signing a lot and am becoming the nursery school music teacher.  The teachers are just learning English, so they do not have many English songs, poems, or plays that they can teach the students.  So, I’m helping them out.  If you have any favorite children’s poems or plays, please send them to me using the email address above. 

Producing my first album:  One challenge the teachers face, is limited access to native English speakers.  So, I’m creating recordings of pronunciation drills, vocabulary, stories, and listening comprehension exercises.  The recordings are a big hit with the teachers.  I, unfortunately, am continually hearing the sound of my own voice.   Does anyone like the sound of their own voice?

Would you pray for:
- The P6 students as they take the national exam this month.  The exam is a significant determiner of their educational future.  Pray that the students would excel in their studies while resting in the love of God as their hope and future. 
- For the four week English seminar over the school break.  Pray that it would be exactly what the teachers need, that they would be quick to learn, and that it would be an enjoyable time. 
- For the devotional series that will accompany the English seminar.  The topic is “Growing in Grace.”  Pray that we would be renewed and refreshed as we reflect on the many facets of God’s grace.

Young Leaders Program Graduation

Yesterday was the graduation celebration for students in the Young Leaders Program.  In Rwanda there is a year long waiting period between High School and University.  So this year, YFC began a nine month internship for these students that includes training in leadership and discipleship and serving their local community and the world.  The students helped build and repair houses and took mission trips to neighboring countries.

The celebration began at 9:00 am and finished with appetizers at noon.  It included a speech by an African YFC leader, singing and dancing, presentation of certificates, some more speeches, and finished with a prayer.  Then we all enjoyed some appetizers and soda.  Some common Rwandan appetizers are sambosa (fried seasoned ground beef in thin triangle shaped pastry shell), cakes (a cross between a sweet bread and a muffin), sausage, and Gouda cheese.

Often at events like these, the women wear traditional Rwandan dresses which are very beautiful.  Check out the photos on the left for more pictures of the celebration.

Thanks Builders without Borders

It's amazing to watch a building go up, especially a two story school building in about two weeks. Builders without Borders has donated and built all of the buildings at KCS (Kigali Christian School). In January, the secondary school will open with two classes of Senior 1 (7th grade). Two building teams arrive this summer to build the new secondary school. In two weeks, about 9 builders and 30 Rwandans completed the framing, roofing, and siding of the new building. Amazing! Check out the pictures to the left.